Unleash The Left Hand

When it comes to rock keyboards, chops and speed often should take a back seat to parts that can cut through the band and drive the music. Check out John Lennon’s churning and broken chords, Elton John’s moving gospel inversions and crashing left-hand octaves, or Roy Bittan’s driving right-hand patterns, and you’ll hear how simple and clear chord movement, strong inner melodies, and parts with compelling forward motion have become the essence of modern rock and pop piano. One way to amplify your right-hand chordal playing is to use your left hand to support the top note melody. This technique is the first step in unlocking the left hand from a limited bass-only role, and will give your playing more sound, power, and dimension.

When it comes to rock keyboards, chops and speed often should take a back seat to parts that can cut through the band and drive the music. Check out John Lennon’s churning and broken chords, Elton John’s moving gospel inversions and crashing left-hand octaves, or Roy Bittan’s driving right-hand patterns, and you’ll hear how simple and clear chord movement, strong inner melodies, and parts with compelling forward motion have become the essence of modern rock and pop piano. One way to amplify your right-hand chordal playing is to use your left hand to support the top note melody. This technique is the first step in unlocking the left hand from a limited bass-only role, and will give your playing more sound, power, and dimension.

Ex. 1. Start with a clear chord progression, like the I-IV-V shown here. The Eb chord momentarily moves down to the Bb chord over an Eb bass, then back to basic Eb, then to the Ab (the IV) and finally the Bb (the V). The top notes of the right-hand chord are a strong melody. The off-beat syncopation is repeated in the second bar and gives the whole phrase continued forward motion. Add the left hand playing octaves and you have a simple and direct sound.

Ex. 2. As shown in 2a, break the right-hand chords into eighth-note groupings of three, three, and two, and the phrase suddenly has drive and forward motion. Accent the first note of each grouping and change the pedal every time the chord changes. Try a variation in 2b: three, two, and three. The quicker chord change on the “and” of beat 3 gives the phrase more syncopation, and a slightly different feel. In the heat of battle, you might be switching at will between many variations. Add the right-hand thumb on the accented beats in 2c, playing a chord tone under the melody. Here, the interval of the sixth on the accents works well, and as long as the damper pedal is down, the thumb note will ring through, so quickly re-striking the thumb won’t sound or feel odd.

Ex. 3. Add the left hand in two stages: First, use the left hand’s thumb in the middle register on the accented beats, as in 3a. This third note completes the chord, and moves in tenths with the melody. Consider the thumb of your left hand as part of the right hand structure, with everything moving together. Playing like this can get you out of the “piano songwriter” rut where the left hand only plays roots and the right hand only plays chords. Spreading the triad between two hands and playing in larger intervals like this is a much different sound than the close voicings of Example 1. When you’re ready, add the bottom: a root in the fifth finger, held down until the chord change. If you’re feeling brave, lift your hand and give a quick pickup note or phrase to take it to the next change. If you’re pedaling right, you’ll never notice the gap.

The same principle can apply in a more chordal style, as in 3b, where the left hand thumb is moving into the right-hand range to support the top voice. The fifth finger of the left hand can play the bass note, and maybe even slip in some embellishments.

Your choice of chord voicings and the style in which you play them is one of the most crucial decisions you can make at the gig or recording session. This is as true for simple rock as it is for complex jazz; perhaps even moreso for rock, because it’s important that over the course of the song, your voicings adapt to the emotional mood or even the lyrics of the current song section. These examples show how I’d approach the problem while keeping to a rock aesthetic — no jazzy chord extensions allowed!

Even accomplished keyboardists sometimes struggle when playing the mighty Hammond B-3 organ — especially if they were trained on piano. It’s not velocitysensitive, has no sustain pedal, and can get louder than heck. Many traditional piano and chord voicing techniques don’t apply on the B-3, so you’ll need to start thinking about playing in a completely different way.

Nothing strikes fear into the hearts of piano players like the mention of stride piano. This seemingly impossible old style is like ragtime on steroids, and pushes jazz pianists to the limit. The left hand alternates a low bass, frequently played in tenths, with close position midrange chords, while the right hand provides melody, syncopations, lines, and runs. The total effect is a relentless, locked-down swing eighth-note feel.

Pianist Floyd Cramer’s “slip note” technique is one of the most identifiable types of riff in country piano playing. Cramer developed this in the ’50s and made it his trademark sound: a relaxed, on-the-beat grace note that usually leads up to a chord tone. As part of a two- or three-part right-hand chord, the “slipped” note itself provides a melodic embellishment, usually an added second (or ninth) or major sixth.